Mayors Meet To Discuss Antigun Strategies

By |October 26, 2006

A coalition of mayors is meeting today in Chicago to talk about strategies for fighting illegal guns and for winning tougher state and federal gun laws, reports USA Today. “A large majority of Americans want some form of common-sense gun legislation,” said Chicago Mayor Richard Daley at a session of Mayors Against Illegal Guns. “They don’t want irresponsible dealers to be allowed to sell guns in bulk to gang-bangers.” The group was organized in April by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino and includes 109 cities in 44 states, among them Los Angeles, Denver, Little Rock, Miami, Atlanta, St. Louis, Omaha, Dallas, Pittsburgh and Seattle.

The mayors’ immediate goal is to stop proposed federal legislation that would permanently bar disclosure of gun-tracing data by the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Once available to cities, the national database has been restricted by Congress every year since 2003. The data had been used by police departments to pinpoint the origin of crime guns. The House has passed the bill; its prospects in the Senate are uncertain. The National Rifle Association says cities should enforce existing gun laws.

The legislation marks a major change for Republicans, who long hve embraced a law-and-order rallying cry. Now many GOP senators argue for rehabilitating more offenders rather than long-time incarceration.

An Arizona doctor argues that the government should have learned from previous federal anti-drug strategies that blanket prohibition doesn’t work. He calls for scrapping attempts to curtail opioids and replacing it with “harm reduction” policies.

Expensive medications for inmates can lead to substandard care and delays in treatment, and that may have lasting—even deadly—consequences for incarcerated individuals, writes a prison health care advocate.

Murder rates in the nation’s 30 largest cities are projected to fall by nearly 6 percent this year according to the latest data, undercutting claims that the nation is experiencing a “crime wave,” says the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law.

School safety commission proposes ending a federal guideline telling schools not to punish minorities at higher rates. The panel largely sidestepped issues relating to guns, although it favors arming some school personnel.